


The Proximity of Things Stupid and Shiny and Perfect

by thisplace_ishaunted



Series: Chris/Ricky High School AU [2]
Category: Motionless in White (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Needles, Piercings, Sexual Tension, Small Blood Mention, boys being stupid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:35:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26222740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisplace_ishaunted/pseuds/thisplace_ishaunted
Summary: There is nobody else he would have trusted to do this, except maybe an actual piercer… but even then, Chris wouldn’t have gotten the pleasure of Ricky standing over him, touching his face and feeling Ricky’s nervous breaths on his skin.Or, in other words, Chris and Ricky are stupid highschool boys that spend their summer day shoving needles in each other's faces.
Relationships: Chris "Motionless" Cerulli/Ricky "Horror" Olson
Series: Chris/Ricky High School AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1904458
Comments: 5
Kudos: 13





	The Proximity of Things Stupid and Shiny and Perfect

**Author's Note:**

> Set 2004, during the summer between Chris and Ricky's junior and senior year of high school. They are the same age in this and attend a private boy's Catholic school.
> 
> PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE DO NOT PIERCE YOURSELF AT HOME. These boys are FUCKIN STUPID TEENAGERS and should NOT BE COPIED. 
> 
> I think this series is just going to be one-shots but in the same AU. Probably little-to-no continuity.
> 
> Also, HOW in the world did this end up being so many words?! This was not intentional but this is somehow my longest piece so far. Sorry, I guess. lol

Chris’ siblings, planted on the couch for the day and playing some sort of video game, barely even turned their heads when Ricky walked through their kitchen door unannounced. Chris’ heart leapt when he heard the door open and shut, knowing Ricky had arrived.  
Ricky and Chris seemed to spend more time in one another’s homes than by themselves, playing guitar together, shootin’ the shit, and always staying for dinner. It was rare that their visits would end before the sun had set, even though the summer days were long and it was still light at 9pm. They would usually walk each other home after that, the streetlights dimly illuminating their path and the crickets chirping.  
Chris’ siblings were his responsibility for the day while his mom worked, and that meant that he couldn’t leave the house. His mom knew, though, that the only way to keep Chris from abandoning his siblings was to also allow Ricky to come over. The summer heat would keep them all inside during the day anyways.  
“Hey,” Ricky called in the doorframe of Chris and Nick’s shared bedroom, announcing his arrival for the day. “I got what we talked about.”  
In Ricky’s hand was a plastic shopping bag, inside which were some questionable sewing needles and a bottle of rubbing alcohol. The two of them had been discussing piercings the day before, neither of them wanting to embarrassingly admit just how much they wanted a piercing in their lip or nose or eyebrow. It was a first step into defying the norm; their way of finally giving the good ole “fuck you” to The Man.  
Neither of them really knew who The Man was, but they knew some flashy jewelry in their faces could earn them some respect at the shows they frequented on the weekends. They hadn’t really considered what they were going to do when summer finally ended and they had to go back to school for another year. Potentially, they would heal by then, and they could use those stupid looking clear studs in an attempt to not lose the holes they were about to so carelessly stab in their faces. That was definitely a problem for another time.  
“Cool, let’s go,” Chris stood up from where he was sitting in his room, and the two of them crossed the hall into the bathroom.  
Chris closed and locked the door as Ricky shoved the assorted toothpaste, lotions, and hairbrushes out of the way in an attempt to clear a workspace. The bathroom was messy and outdated, but that is what happened when three kids shared one bathroom.  
“Did you get the jewelry too?” Chris asked, handing Ricky a hand towel to lay down as a workstation.  
“Yeah, somebody told me that you have to use studs because your lip swells up while it’s healing. If you use a ring, it fucks it up and doesn’t heal right.”  
At least Ricky sounded like he knew what he was talking about, more so than Chris, who thought he might just be able to stab a safety pin through his lip and hope it healed.  
The two of them had seen a person with snakebite piercings in one of their music magazines, and it caught Ricky’s eye. Over the past couple years, Chris had been seeing Davey Havok with his lip ring in the music videos of AFI. Chris had originally just wanted the one, but Ricky had convinced him that the symmetry would look better and that having both sides was the new big thing.  
“Are you sure you want to match each other though? Don’t you think that is a little much?” Chris asked, partially because he still wanted just the one, and partially because he was a little afraid of having to get stabbed not only once, but twice.  
“Two is better than one! Plus it will look cool, I promise,” Ricky answered reassuringly. Chris was used to having Ricky convince him of things. Chris was a little spineless when it came to Ricky.  
“I also think you should go first, because I know I am not going to bitch out, but you will.” Ricky pointed to the toilet, telling Chris to take a seat.  
Chris sat reluctantly, feeling the inside of his bottom lip with his tongue. This would probably be the last time he could do such thing without feeling something foreign there.  
Ricky washed his hands before opening the packages of short lip studs he had bought at the mall. The plastic gave suddenly as Ricky ripped it open, sending the studs scattering across the counter. He rescued the four of them from around the counter, placing them side by side on the towel. He drenched them with rubbing alcohol, the liquid absorbing into the surface where they sat.  
Ricky opened the package of sewing needles he had stolen from his house, pulling out the thickest one available. Hopefully, it was thick enough for the jewelry to slide in afterwards.  
“I’m going to mark you first with a Sharpie so we can get it all lined up,” Ricky said, turning to Chris, whose knee was bouncing with anxiety.  
Ricky uncapped the black marker and crouched down to be level with Chris. His eyebrows scrunched with concentration as he held up his hand center to Chris’ face, dividing it in half, and placed the first mark. The stubby and worn out Sharpie left a relatively huge dot on the boarder of Chris’ lower lip. A second dot followed, placed with the flawed, attempted precision of someone who had never done this before. As much as Ricky was trying his best, both of them knew that they didn’t actually know what they were doing.  
“I think that is pretty even. You should look,” Ricky moved out of the way of the mirror, allowing Chris to stand and assess for himself.  
After leaning into the mirror, turning his head from side to side, puckering his lips and letting them relax, Chris concluded, “Looks fine to me.”  
“Cool, let’s do this then.” Ricky grabbed his chosen needle, and Chris sat back down.  
Ricky stepped in-between Chris’ knees and leaned down to get a closer look at Chris’ lip. Chris’ chin tilted upwards and his mouth fell open, sticking out his bottom lip for Ricky to grab.  
Chris was suddenly aware of both of their breathing, not wanting his hot exhales to be noticed by the other. Why did he suddenly become aware of such normal actions? Was it stupid for him to become self conscious when the space between them was minimized? Chris began to timidly exhale out his nose as Ricky grabbed his bottom lip between his finger and thumb, pulling it outward slightly.  
“You ready?” Ricky asked, Chris responding with the tiniest nod and a couple blinks.  
Ricky lined up the needle to the Sharpied target he had drawn, Chris took a breath, and on the exhale, Ricky pushed the needle through Chris’ lip.  
A short sound somewhere between a grunt and a moan was made in Chris’ throat. He tried his best not to move his lips, but the pain was stinging through his face and into his cheek. The needle had been pushed through successfully, but now sat in Chris’ lip, the sharp point scraping his gums on the inside.  
Ricky released his grip and said, “Don’t move,” before stepping away and grabbing one of the studs from the counter. He unscrewed the ball end, the flat end making a post which he would have to shove through the brand new hole in Chris’ face.  
Chris continued breathing through the sting, his lip slightly quivering as he kept it jutted out. Ricky’s touch hurt when he reached out again to grab Chris’ lip and pull it down, ready to put the jewelry in.  
“This is the part that is going to suck, but I’m going to try my best.”  
Chris couldn’t respond, but if he could, he would have reassured Ricky that he trusted him. Not only did he trust Ricky to figure out how to put the jewelry in, he trusted Ricky that this was a good idea in the first place, that stabbing each other with unsterilized needles in his badly lit bathroom was a good idea. There is nobody else he would have trusted to do this, except maybe an actual piercer… but even then, Chris wouldn’t have gotten the pleasure of Ricky standing over him, touching his face and feeling Ricky’s nervous breaths on his skin. It was worth it.  
Ricky pulled the needle out the front, and quickly followed with the stud from the inside. This push of the jewelry hurt like a bitch, as the area was already irritated. Ricky was able to successfully push it through, followed up by him screwing the front ball on as tight as he could.  
“Whew, that one is done. I’m gonna do the other one real quick before the adrenaline wears off.” Ricky grabbed the needle once again and straddled Chris’ leg, trying to get the best angle possible. Chris wouldn’t admit that the way the insides of Ricky’s knees were brushing the sides of his thigh was enough to distract him from the ache radiating from the new piercing.  
The second piercing went similarly to the first, but hurt a lot more. Chris’ adrenaline was already wavering; his sensitivity was heightened by not only the voluntary wound already stabbed through his face, but the closeness of Ricky’s body. His clammy hands touching his chin and his lips and the inside of his mouth. What a weird place to touch somebody.  
Once the second stud was successfully tightened, Ricky stood up straight and backed away.  
“I think they look good, dude. Go look.”  
Chris stood from the toilet again, stepping into the mirror and seeing how his face was now adorned with two shiny silver studs. He ran his tongue over the inside of his lip, and he had been correct, he could now feel the two small metal plates, flat against the sensitive tissue.  
“Wow,” was all Chris could say. The foreign objects would take getting used to as he spoke, but for now, his bottom lip just felt puffy and swollen. “So it’s your turn now?”  
Ricky sat down on top of the toilet seat, way more eagerly than Chris could have expected. Ricky should probably have been at least a little nervous, but instead he was the type of person to get a thrill out of getting voluntarily stabbed. Chris liked him for this, most likely because he had had the opposite type of anticipation.  
Chris stepped closer to Ricky, marker in hand, ready to place his targets. After crouching, standing further back, and becoming generally frustrated, Chris admitted he couldn’t get a good angle.  
“I think you’re gonna have to sit higher; you’re too low for me.”  
“Are you calling me short?” Ricky replied with a laugh.  
“I’m not _not_ calling you short. Here,” Chris stepped back and moved the towel from the counter.  
Ricky hopped up onto the corner of the countertop, his legs dangling and kicking back and forth in anticipation. This height was going to work way better for Chris, who now was able to better see Ricky, only slightly higher than eye level.  
Chris moved in close, using the same vertical hand trick that Ricky used on him, attempting to find some sort of symmetry between the two sides. He placed the two dots carefully before asking, “Check if that works for you.”  
“No, it’s okay. I trust you,” Ricky responded, a bit of a smile peaking at the edges of his mouth, stretching the marked dots.  
“Are you sure?”  
“Yeah, it’s fine, just do it.”  
Chris grabbed another needle from where he had moved the towel, and took a second to look at the task before him. He really didn’t want to fuck this up; he wanted Ricky to think he did a good job, to think he was worthy of Ricky’s trust in him. Chris could feel the body heat radiating off of Ricky’s chest, level with Chris’ face. He hadn’t ever been this physically close to him before, and now the insides Ricky’s thighs were grazing Chris’ hip bones as he stood in front of him. He kind of just wanted Ricky to wrap his stupid legs around him and keep him trapped there, close to his chest and his neck and his body heat.  
A knock rapped on the closed door, breaking Chris’ train of thought, followed by a shout, “What are you doing in there?”  
“Nick! Mind your own business!” Chris called out, his words sounding slightly off. His lip had continued to swell and was making it more difficult to speak. Hopefully Nick wouldn’t notice.  
“I have to pee, hurry up!” The complaint was muffled by the door.  
“Just go in Mom’s bathroom!”  
They could hear the floor creak as Nick walked away from the door, leaving the two of them to continue their work. Chris turned back to Ricky, shaking his head and trying to regain his composure.  
Chris reached up and grabbed Ricky’s bottom lip, pulling it out slightly, and raised the needle. Chris glanced up to Ricky’s eyes, looking for some sort of sign of assurance, and could nearly hear the buzz of nerves between the two of them. Ricky didn’t have to say anything for Chris to know it was okay to continue.  
Only possibly involuntarily, Ricky squeezed his knees together into Chris’ body as the needle pushed through his lip and broke through the other side. Although Ricky was quick to release his legs, the movement had not gone unnoticed by Chris.  
Chris reached over, grabbing one of the remaining two studs, and turned back to find a line of blood had began to drip from where the needle had freshly broken through Ricky’s lip.  
“Shit, Rick, you’re bleeding.” Chris suddenly realized that this was his fault. Ricky hadn’t made _him_ bleed, and here he was, screwing this up. Ricky couldn’t really respond, other than looking downward in an attempt to see what was happening.  
Chris instinctively stuck his thumb in his mouth, coating it with spit, before using the side of his thumb to wipe upward. He was careful not to get too close to the needle still dangling out of Ricky’s lip. Chris wiped his thumb on his jeans and wiped Ricky’s face again, only then realizing how weird what he just did actually was.  
Ricky didn’t seem to care, more concerned with ensuring he wasn’t going to continue bleeding. It seemed to have stopped.  
The piece of jewelry managed to slide in without any issues, and Ricky helped screw the ball on tightly.  
“You ready for the second one?” Chris asked.  
Ricky nodded, assumedly not speaking because of the pain.  
Chris once again gently pulled out Ricky’s lower lip, found a quick second of eye contact with him, and on Ricky’s exhale, shoved the needle through. The two of them were used to this pattern by now.  
Except this time, when Chris unscrewed the tiny ball of the last stud, it fell from his fingertips. Luckily it did not bounce off the counter and off into oblivion, but just as unluckily, landed on Ricky’s lap, where the fabric of his jeans rippled from his seated position. Chris almost reached to grab it, but caught himself, thinking that it was _just_ too close to Ricky’s crotch for comfort.  
Chris’ hesitation was noticeable, and Ricky brought his hand up to grab the tiny object before handing it off to Chris. Their fingertips slid across one another as they exchanged the item with care, careful to not drop it again. For Chris, somehow this graze of fingertips was even more gut-wrenching than the whole experience up until this point.  
Chris was able to pull the needle out and replace it with the stud. Ricky helped him screw the balls on tight; hopefully none of them would fall off as the piercings healed.  
“Okay, let’s see.” Ricky hopped off the counter, and stood next to Chris in the mirror.  
The two of them were now matching, the silver jewelry catching the light from the yellowing light fixture above the sink. Both of their lips were red and swollen, but luckily, Ricky’s was no longer bleeding.  
“I think you did a good job, thank you,” Chris said to Ricky, the two of them making eye contact in the mirror.  
“Me? I’m a rookie, but I think you could have a future in this,” Ricky said, smiling, but then immediately grimacing in pain and relaxing his mouth. He let out a chuckle at his mistake.  
“Well, there are multiple careers I could pursue that involve stabbing people. The question is if they ask for it or not.”  
Chris’ deadpan delivery made the both of them burst out in laughter and smiles, them both fighting through the sting of their new matching piercings. Them sharing the laugh together was more than worth it.  


From this point forward, Chris was unable to ever keep Ricky’s body from his mind… the slenderness of his limbs, the way his uniform dress shirt hung too loose off his shoulders, the way the inside of his wrists were just pale enough to see the veins underneath. Every day he noticed more and more details about Ricky, storing them away in his mind, scared that one day he might run out of new things to notice. He hoped that never happened.  
Chris was now cursed with the unrelenting _awareness_ of Ricky around him. He didn’t know if they would be able to just hang out ever again without Chris constantly checking in on the precise location of Ricky’s every limb… not only the location, but the proximity of every part of Ricky’s being in relation to Chris’. Were their hands, although hanging at their sides, drawn like a magnet to reach out and grab the other’s? Were their thighs, while seated on a bench at school, less than an inch apart? Were their bodies, unquestionably content until this moment, never to feel complete again without one another?


End file.
